『Initialising system trait...』
『Initialisation complete.』
『System trait: 'Beekeeper' has been selected.』
『...』
『Rebooting player....』
*
Han woke up to an aching spine and stiffened muscles. It felt as if his bones had been ripped out of him and replaced with burning iron.
He opened his eyes slowly, welcomed into a room of pure white light.
"Wh-where am I?" he whispered, groggily getting to his feet. His mind felt fogged.
Just then, a scream pierced the air.
Han whipped around and found other students crying and screaming behind him. For among them, were the broken bodies of the kids who hadn't made it.
Han gagged as he lay eyes on a girl who had been folded over, scorpion-like. Muddied shoe marks covered her shirt.
'Fucking hell.'
"Everyone, remain calm. I think I know what's going on," a voice announced.
Han turned to find it was coming from a chubby boy with glasses.
However, before the boy could continue, another girl woke up and started screaming as soon as she realised a dead body was lying right next to her.
That set off a chain reaction. Some students began running, others just continued crying and shivering. However, there were a few among them who remained silent. Who instead inspected the odd room they were in.
'By now, some people must have also noticed it...'
'This room... it doesn't make sense.'
The room they were in, if it could even be called that, seemed to go on infinitely in all directions. In fact, it was more accurate to call it a white void, but Han's mind refused to accept the illogical.
A loud chime echoed, and a moment later, a section of the white floor turned green.
『First Quest: Step into the safezone.』
'Safezone?' Han wondered, staring at the green tile beneath him. 'Safe from what?'
『5!』
『4!』
The chubby boy flung himself onto the tile right beside Han, scuffling away from the white.
『2!』
『1!』
『Clearing stage.』
"Clearing stage? What the hell is going on!" Han shouted, unable to bear the senselessness of what was happening.
"Shh, watch," The chubby boy whispered, pointing to the students who had decided to run.
The white floor flashed black.
Then...
"No... wait!" a girl screamed as she tried running back towards the safezone.
However, her legs were already gone.
The floor had become a sort of black sludge, eating away at both flesh and bone like acid. The girl turned into a puddle of crimson soup in mere seconds.
Screams echoed in the void, and in a few breaths, all those outside the safezone were erased.
『First stage complete!』
『Processing rewards...』
The chubby boy sighed, and he got to his feet. "We've been transmigrated," he said, snapping Han out of his daze.
"Transmigrated?"
The chubby boy shoved his glasses up with two fingers. "I've read every transmigration manga there is. And I'm 100% certain."
"Yeah... but what exactly does transmigration mean?" Han asked, his focus glued on a girl pulling her hair out in a daze. It seemed like some people's minds were beginning to break... and based on the crazy shit the chubby boy was talking about, he'd probably broken too.
"You don't watch anime?" The chubby boy asked with a disgusted expression. "I thought you were like me, one of the main protagonists," he sighed.
"Well, I'll meet them eventually," he continued, giving a little laugh, before walking away.
'He's an odd one.'
『Reward selected! : System Manual.』
'There it is again. That strange voice.'
An instant later, the floor turned back white, and even the black acid was covered once again. However, no one had any intention of stepping out the safezone.
"Welcome, players," a voice called from above.
Han craned his neck and saw a shimmering orb of light floating above them.
'Aliens?'
"Are you an angel? Is this hell?" someone shouted up.
"What's going on? Why are you doing this?" someone else shouted.
Soon, there was so much shouting that they could barely hear what the orb was saying.
And it didn't seem as if the orb could hear them either.
"Everyone, quiet!"
A girl with long jet black hair and a black pin on her school blazer stepped to the centre. The Student Body President, Nari.
"I need all of you to stay calm and listen," she announced, her dead eyes focused on the orb above them. "I know people... friends... have died, and you're all confused. But this is my chance at finding answers, our chance at maybe making it out of this," she continued.
"Now let the orb speak; we can ask questions after."
Her voice was calm, authoritative... and bored almost. It was as if she hadn't seen the horrors they'd just witnessed.
'She's right. Panicking won't get us anywhere. If we want to survive, we need information.'
Most quieted down after that, listening to the orb with tears running down their cheeks.
"... invoke 'Trait' to open your system screen," the orb continued.
'Invoke? Like to call out loud?'
"Trait!" The chubby boy was the first of them to shout it.
Han followed right after, then Nari, and soon everyone was saying it.
『Loading System Screen...』
┏━━━━━━━━━━━┓
─System Overview─
〖Trait: Beekeeper〗
〖Grade: U〗
〖*Rank: Newborn〗
─Player Details─
〖Level 1: (0/5)〗
〖Health: 100/100〗
┗━━━━━━━━━━━┛
The orb continued talking even as people mumbled questions amongst each other. All the while, the chubby boy had a grin on his face.
'A system overview? So what? We're in some sort of game?'
"...can invoke trait names to open their skills index..." the orb droned on in the background.
The chubby boy had a smug expression as he glanced at Nari. "Copy Skill!" he shouted. It seemed like he had decided who his other 'protagonist' was.
Nari didn't react, simply calling hers out as well. "Judge, Juror, Executioner."
'This isn't good at all.' Han hesitated.
'Beekeeper? Why the hell is my trait called beekeeper?' He let out a crazed chuckle.
If others had trait names like copy skill, it meant his was probably a sub-par version. And in a survival situation like this, the sub-par were going to be treated as less than human.
'Even here, people are being born to power, huh?' he thought, his laughter attracting concerned gazes.
Another loud chime interrupted his thinking. And he instinctively tensed up.
"...If the player's health reaches 0. A death penalty will be applied, regardless of the severity of damage taken," the orb continued.
'This really is like a game,' Han thought.
"That concludes the system manual."
And with that, the orb vanished into thin air.
『New Stage requirements processing..』
The white void around them began to dim, revealing metallic walls.
Once the white had completely disappeared, a door-sized section of the metallic wall furthest from Han dissolved, revealing sunlight.
'An exit.'
A small green creature stepped through the door, dressed in rags and carrying a massive club.
Then another, and another.
Soon, there was an entire horde of them, toothy grins dripping foam to the floor.
One cackled, a bone-chilling noise like hyenas on the prowl.
Then it hurled its club.
The boy beside Han didn't even have time to scream. His skull burst open, blood and brain matter spraying across Han's face.
Han stared in disbelief.
"What... the... fuck!"
『New Quest decided!』
『Survive.』